Three young women who were held captive in Cleveland inside a home for over a decade issued on Monday a video on YouTube in which the three expressed their thanks to the public for the financial and emotional support that is giving them the opportunity to restart their lives once again.
Gina DeJesus, Michelle Knight and Amanda Berry broke their collective public silence in their three and a half minute video posted in the video website at midnight.
The three said the prayers and support of their families, friends and of the general public has allowed them to start rebuilding their lives following their difficult ordeal.
The three women went missing separately from 2002 to 2004. At the time of their disappearance, they ranged in age between 14 and 20.
Ariel Castro a resident of Cleveland has pleaded not guilty to the 329 counts against him alleging he kidnapped the girls from the streets and then held them in his home captive for as long as a decade.
The former school bus driver, who is 52, fathered a child who is now 6 years old with Berry. He is accused of punching and starving Knight causing the woman to have a miscarriage.
On May 6, he was arrested after Berry was able to break a door in the home and yell for help to neighbors.
The parents of DeJesus thanked everyone who donated to a fund that had been set up to help each of the women.
Then again one wonders too what these women actually thought during their captivity, if they ever believed in freedom one day or whether they had simply one day acquiesced to the horror that had befallen them, similarly in a way so many of us so often accept debilitating circumstances in real life? Which is to say did this day of freedom and redemption catch them beyond their wildest dreams?
After all how many of us can literally believe in salvation when in the deepest throes of hell and torment at such a visceral level….?
http://scallywagandvagabond.com/2013/07/cleveland-kidnap-victims-explain-that-misery-is-just-a-smile-in-your-face/